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Welcome to the Balanced Bites podcast with Diane Sanfilippo and Liz Wolfe. Diane is a certified nutrition consultant, and the New York Times bestselling author of Practical Paleo, The 21-Day Sugar Detox, and co-author of Mediterranean Paleo Cooking. Liz is a nutritional therapy practitioner, and the best-selling author of Eat the Yolks and The Purely Primal Skincare Guide. Together, Diane and Liz answer your questions, interview leading health and wellness experts, and share their take on modern paleo living with their friendly and balanced approach. Remember our disclaimer: The materials and content within this podcast are intended as general information only, and are not to be considered a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.

Diane Sanfilippo: You just wanted to be like, “What’s up friends!”{laughs}

Liz Wolfe: Hey, girl, hey! How about a word from our sponsors?

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1. What’s new for you from Diane & Liz [2:10]

Liz Wolfe: Awesome. So that happened.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}

Liz Wolfe: Sponsors, done. Check that box.

Diane Sanfilippo: Love it.

Liz Wolfe: How you doing, friend?

Diane Sanfilippo: I’m doing pretty well. Doing pretty well. Just hanging out. This morning’s sunrise was this burning red color peaking through some clouds, and I was so desperately trying to take a picture, and I was like, this darn camera in my phone just does not pick up what the human eye picks up. And I’m shaking my fist at technology, but at the same time realizing that’s kind of a beautiful thing. {laughs} that it can’t, because I just had to stand there and look at it and be like, alright, can’t share that with anyone. Hey honey; grabbed Scott. I was like, “come look at the sunrise!” {laughs} He thinks I’m crazy every day that I say that, and then today he was like, “whoa, that’s cool!” So, anyway. That’s what’s up over here. {laughs} What’s up over there?

Liz Wolfe: You just completely Ron Swanson’d me out…

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}

Liz Wolfe: Anybody that remembers this is going to laugh.

Diane Sanfilippo: That wasn’t my actual update, that just the “what’s up with me.”

Liz Wolfe: No, no. you’ll love it.

Diane Sanfilippo: Ok.

Liz Wolfe: Because one of my favorite episodes is when they do an art show, or something like that, and he goes; I have him in my head. “I also think it’s pointless for a human to paint scenes of nature, when they go outside and stand in it.” {laughs}

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughing}

Liz Wolfe: “People did them, and they are here now.”

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} That’s amazing.

Liz Wolfe: I love him. One of the great characters of all television history.

Diane Sanfilippo: I am glad that we finally did the whole Parks and Rec marathon last summer; Scott and I watched it.

Liz Wolfe: Oh my gosh.

Diane Sanfilippo: But unfortunately, I haven’t rewatched enough episodes to know lines and know everything. We’re rewatching Friends right now, and I shockingly remember far more lines from that show than I ever thought I would, because I just haven’t watched it in a long time. But you just don’t forget. You just don’t.

Liz Wolfe: I don’t think I had enough context for how rare a really good 30-minute…

Diane Sanfilippo: Mmm; sit-com.

Liz Wolfe: Sit-com with laugh track.

Diane Sanfilippo: So good.

Liz Wolfe: It’s hard to find a good one. Friends was really good.

Diane Sanfilippo: It’s good. It’s like almost too good now when you watch it, because you’re like, “I know what that joke is. I know where it’s going.” Anyway, some updates, some legit updates relevant to the stuff we do around here. The first thing I want to update folks on is that we have a call for questions over on the Balanced Bites podcast Instagram, which you can also go ahead and submit the question through the website, because we’re asking what you guys want to know about digestion. We’ve talked about digestion a bunch of times on the show before, of course. We’ve talked about it with Chris Kresser, I talked about it with Melissa Ramos, we talked about it with Christa Orecchio. Lots of people we’ve talked about digestion with.

But I’ve got a good friend, Robin Youkilis. She has a new book coming out called Go With Your Gut, and I thought it would be really fun to ask her a lot of these digestion questions. Because she’s got her book coming out soon, and she’s a great resource, fellow health coach and just fantastic person all around to help guide you guys. I thought that would be really fun to ask her some of those questions, so stay tuned for that. I’ll be talking with her in the coming weeks. I think her book comes out early March. It’s a cool guide for people.

The only other thing I wanted to share with you all, and I’m about to open up website to make sure I’m sharing this properly. But I’ve got a new sort of; it’s not quite a new series, but one way that we’re trying to harness all of the random content that’s coming out of my, I don’t know what you would call it. {laughs} My pie hole. All the Periscope videos, whatever is going on Instagram, Facebook, etc.; even here on the podcast. Trying to put it in a boiled down version of what was important the week before if you’re somebody that likes to follow the work that I’m doing and make sure that you don’t miss out on something; a little snippet, a new recipe, etc.

So I’ve got a new team member, Kate, and she’s helping out with content coordination, as a lot of you guys may have seen. I was looking for someone to help out just a few weeks ago, and Kate came on board recently. So we’ve got a new post going up every week called What’s up Weekly with Diane, and the first one is a January 10th edition. It’s just giving you a handful of snippets; little things that have been going on. I think we have like 3 or 4 major highlights linking to the new podcast, and then just some other popular stuff that was going on in the previous week. So hopefully that will help those of you who have been feeling overwhelmed by the content creation that’s going on.

My email newsletters will feature some of what’s in the post, but the email newsletter also features subscriber exclusives, as you guys know that we talk about every week on this podcast. At the end of the show, we always tell you guys that we’ve got stuff that’s in there. So not everything that’s in the email will be on the blog post, and then the blog post might have some additional content that I’m pointing to. But those exclusives, like the eBooks and some other special freebies; I think we might end up doing like a weekly question kind of deal that I’m answering just in the email.

I know, Liz, you’ve done that in the past as well. Kind of like; almost an “Ask Liz” type of thing where you’ve had emails come out with some great Q&A, so we may do some of that in the email as well, just hot topics and what not. So anyway, you guys can check that out over at BalancedBites.com. it’s What’s Up Weekly With Diane.

Liz Wolfe: “What’s Up!” That’s “Wake up!” Never mind.

Diane Sanfilippo: I know!

Liz Wolfe: Shoot.

Diane Sanfilippo: “Waaaake up! San Francisco!”

Liz Wolfe: Yeah.

Diane Sanfilippo: I feel like we need a theme song for What’s Up Weekly. So what’s up with you, Liz?

Liz Wolfe: Yeah. My gig will be; we’ll do a book signing and I’ll be doing a talk on Sunday the 20th, I believe it’s the 20th, it’s that Sunday. And what I’m talking about is the bare basics of blogging to support your business. So this is not like, like Diane is way, way ahead of me on actually having a glorious, well-oiled machine of a website.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}

Liz Wolfe: {laughs} But for me, I want to talk to the people who want to put their practice online and want to have kind of a portal for finding their services that brings people in and is well put together and navigatable, and literally just don't know where to start. I see a lot of amazing real food oriented folks on Instagram, and I see these blogs that they’re keeping, and there are just some really basic things that need to happen to make it look legit and to make it more of a pleasure to read. We’ll also talk about the content that needs to be there and the type of content that’s kind of a waste of time.

So, I think it can be really beneficial for people that are already doing it just to kind of check in on those foundational things that everybody needs to get going, but mostly I want to target the people that just aren’t quite sure if what they’re doing is going to provide the appropriate infrastructure for moving forward. And I am going to be coming from a place of; I did a lot of things wrong at the beginning, and now I’m going back and trying to fix them, and pawing through years and years of stuff that was built upon that flawed infrastructure {laughs} and trying to put things back where they’re supposed to go.

Diane Sanfilippo: Mm-hmm.

Liz Wolfe: So I’m a work in progress, and I’ll share some stories from my experience, and also some recommendations for people that cater to beginners, as far as web help and things like that.

Diane Sanfilippo: Cool.

Liz Wolfe: So, it should be great.

Diane Sanfilippo: P. S., I think every website, every blogger, for people listening who are running their own business, etc., there is always infrastructure that needs to be fixed for every website, every business. There are certain things about my site that are for sure well-oiled, and then there’s tons of behind the scenes stuff that we’re always trying to retrofit.

Liz Wolfe: It’s never ending.

Diane Sanfilippo: So, nobody needs to feel inadequate looking at my website. Because, it looks pretty, because I’m a designer, but tracking and a lot of stuff on the backend, we’re still working on, so nobody needs to feel like everybody has it all figured out, because nobody does.

Liz Wolfe: Nobody does. And we’re going to tease our little thing related to that here in just a second, but I wanted to; I’ll do my other updates really quick. I started a, I guess it’s kind of a Facebook mom’s group; it’s called Parenthood with Real Food Liz, and it really is just a casual Facebook group for anybody that’s wanting to follow my mom’s journey and I guess kind of see what I like and what I use and hear about different mom finds that I run across.

Everyday I’m doing something, or I run across something where I’m like; “oh, I’d love to share this with people who are part of my real food community,” but the Real Food Liz Facebook page, I built that on the back of food and I don’t want to start blathering about mom stuff all the time to the percentage of the audience that’s not interested in that at all, I feel like that’s not really fair. Plus that page doesn’t get spit out into people’s newsfeed; as a lot of people know, Facebook pages don’t always come up in the Facebook newsfeed thanks to Facebook algorithm. And then it’s the same with Instagram now, too, so if I post something on Instagram, a lot of that stuff gets throttled, as well.

So I thought I would just start a private mommy/parent/parents-to-be/parent-curious type of group for people to come in. You can ask questions, like basic questions, it’s not the place to get a lot of advice on the really serious stuff with regards to parenthood and baby making, but I will post favorite products, tips and tricks that I come across, and other people can share as well. So it should be fun. It’s kind of a; it’s an experiment, so we’ll see how it goes. But if you want to request to join that group, I posted about it on the Real Food Liz Facebook page, and I also posted about it on my Instagram, so you can find it that way, and request to join. And we’re working to let everybody in. Once every week or once every two weeks or so to get that moving.

I do want to just kind of open up a little bit and share a little tidbit, because people are just so excited about Baby Making and Beyond, and that’s amazing to me. I’m so grateful for all of the interest and excitement about it. I just want people to know, we’re working really hard on the program. We’ve been working on it, as a lot of listeners to the podcast know, for a really long time, and I feel finally comfortable just kind of saying this, because it’s something I’ve held kind of close to the vest for a while.

A lot of the last year; well, less than a year, probably half of the year, has been me processing my birth experience. Because it went zero percent as I had planned for it to go. And even as someone who I felt; you know, I feel like I was well educated, I knew what I wanted it to look like, and I worked really hard to make it that way. But crazy things happen, and they happen all the time. I always kind of thought I was going to be that person who did it all right, and you know, plan it a certain way and it ends up that way, you know what I mean.

Diane Sanfilippo: Yep.

Liz Wolfe: But it just didn’t, and I’ve had to do a ton of healing. And that has had to become a little bit of a priority for me, and it’s also going to make the program better. I think that I was missing a huge chunk of what the program needed to be until I started digging into that healing from my birth experience. And I just never realized how important that was, to process your own birth and to feel it. So, I want people to know how amazing this program is shaping up to be; in part because it’s not just about the nutrition stuff, the fertility stuff; it’s about becoming a human parent, which you don’t think about when you’re pregnant. You don’t think about the enormity of the experience and the way it’s just going to crack open; the plates shift and all of a sudden the enormity of the experience before the baby comes is almost dwarfed by this chasm before you of; wow, I just went through that, and now I’m a parent too.

So, I wish that I could explain it a little bit better than that, but I’m just really excited about what this program is going to bring to people after birth and newborn stuff, as well. So thank you everyone.

Liz Wolfe: I hope it makes sense. It’s not something that I could have; I don’t think I really would have gotten it before as a pregnant person if I was listening to somebody say those things.

Diane Sanfilippo: Mm-hmm.

Liz Wolfe: But, I want to have; I don’t feel like I can get people prepared for parenthood without this other half of things. So it’s really going to be; I mean, it’s just… my head is cracked open, and I found where my rainbow string was hiding.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}

Liz Wolfe: Right? All the thoughts coming out of my brain. But I think I can bring a lot to it now that I’ve started clawing through a lot of what was kind of resting on my soul from what happened during my birth experience. I think I will share a little bit more about it within that group; within in the Baby Making and Beyond safe space. I’m still not really ready to talk about it too much, because it’s not just my story it’s also my child’s story and my husband’s story and our little family’s story. So I’m kind of figuring out how to negotiate that. But that’s where we’re at there. It’s not delayed a whole lot farther, or anything like that. But I just want people to understand that’s kind of why it’s taken a long time to birth that baby.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} I think there’s just so much value in that, as well, from the perspective of; I remember when you were pregnant, and seemingly you had almost an easy time of being pregnant.

Liz Wolfe: Mm-hmm.

Diane Sanfilippo: And not to say that I would ever wish any struggle on someone while they’re pregnant or during the birth process, any of that; I would never with that on anyone. I would hope that it goes as planned and as expected for everyone. But I think that the amazing insight that comes and the amount of time you’ve spent kind of processing it and all of that, it only serves to allow you to better support everyone that you intended on supporting with the program.

Liz Wolfe: Yeah.

Diane Sanfilippo: I think it’s just; that makes it, it’s like that “ah-ha!” I needed to have that experience, not to say, you know; I mean, of course, I have the “everything happens for a reason” mindset, and that’s, for some people, it doesn’t sit well. But I think that when you find a silver lining in a way, of, ok I can use this for better, for good, and to help people; I just think that’s the upside of anything, and knowing that you will help so many people with that experience.

Liz Wolfe: Yeah.

Diane Sanfilippo: And it is so much more than I’ve ever seen with other programs that do talk, as you said, just kind of about the nutrition and are really kind of tactical about things without some of the more emotional elements that may come into play, and like the big picture stuff.

Liz Wolfe: Definitely.

Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome.

Liz Wolfe: Yep, yep.

Diane Sanfilippo: Alright, so should we tell people what we were kind of about to mention before we get into some questions here?

Liz Wolfe: Yeah!

Diane Sanfilippo: So, I think what’s going to happen is March 17th, we think, pencil it in, we should probably nail this down within the next few weeks. I’m hoping we’ll be able to nail it down maybe by the end of the month, by the end of January. But we’re thinking maybe March 17th we’ll have a live event, myself and Liz, in Portland. So if you’re in the area, or if you were considering going to the NTA conference, or if you want to travel to Portland because, why not? Go eat at Departure. {laughs}

Liz Wolfe: {laughs}

Diane Sanfilippo: Eat some amazing food all around Portland. We’re going to do a live event probably Thursday evening; we’ll give you guys more details on that when we have them, and I’m sure there will be an RSVP link and all that good stuff and tickets and whatnot. But pencil that into your calendar, March 17th, Portland. Don’t pencil the burp in. I just burped {laughs} don’t pencil the burp in your calendar {laughing}.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} Lower than what? Lower than those packed in water? Lower than what? Yeah, I don’t know what that question is.

Liz Wolfe: Is there a rumor going around that olive oil has some kind of destructive power over omega-3s?

Diane Sanfilippo: I have no idea. I’ve actually never heard this, so I’m with you. I would say no.

Liz Wolfe: Yeah.

Diane Sanfilippo: The only caveat I would have there is, if you’re getting them packed in olive oil, you know probably the Portuguese sardines packed in olive oil, those are probably pretty good. I don’t know; do you buy them packed in olive oil or do you get them packed in water?

Liz Wolfe: Water.

Diane Sanfilippo: Water, yeah me too.

Liz Wolfe: Or, as they say in New Jersey, “wooder.”

Diane Sanfilippo: No, they say that in South Jersey and in Philly. It’s not a typical Jersey thing, “wooder.”

Liz Wolfe: Excuse me.

Diane Sanfilippo: Get out.

Liz Wolfe: Get out.

Diane Sanfilippo: Get out of here. So yeah, we typically both get them packed in water, so I’m not sure, I don’t know where that rumor came from. Real food rumors, #realfoodrumors. {laughs}

3. Risk of eggs in homemade mayo [21:25]

Liz Wolfe: {laughing} Alright, this one is from {laughs} I was going to say M. B. Danger, like dang it. I think it’s M. B. Danger.

Diane Sanfilippo: I think it’s M. B. Danger, and I think that the question is ironic, given that handle. Proceed.

Liz Wolfe: Oh my. “What are the chances of getting sick from making your own mayo? I’ve always been nervous about raw eggs.” What’s that movie that Ben Stiller was in?

Diane Sanfilippo: M. B. Danger, I just feel like…. Oh.

Liz Wolfe: Along Came Polly, where he calculated risk.

Diane Sanfilippo: Yes! {laughs}

Liz Wolfe: Yeah.

Diane Sanfilippo: Nervous about raw eggs. So, I generally would recommend that if you’re making your own mayo to do so from pastured eggs, not pasteurized but pastured so they’re super high quality eggs. And at the very least, organic. And it’s going to be yolk, not the white. I don’t know what the chances; do you know?

Liz Wolfe: I don’t know that that’s ever been calculated. I don’t think it could be calculated.

Diane Sanfilippo: I don’t know that there’s data on this.

Liz Wolfe: I know. Yeah. I would much rather; I don’t want to say that. Yes I do. I don’t know if I want to say that.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughing}

Liz Wolfe: I would rather take my chances with mayo made from raw egg than eat one of those fake mayo substitutes with all the emulsifiers and the crazy stuff in it.

Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah.

Liz Wolfe: I don’t know. I, if your stomach acid is pretty good…

Diane Sanfilippo: The mayo you buy in a store is made with raw egg. I mean, if you get packaged mayo, that was made with raw egg. I’m not sure what the story is on how they process it so that it’s shelf stable before you open it. You know what I mean?

Liz Wolfe: Yeah, I don’t know.

Diane Sanfilippo: Or what they’re doing if they’re doing any sort of pasteurization. We should ask the folks over at Primal Kitchen; they might be able to tell us what makes it different from homemade in terms of shelf life; especially even in your fridge. But that’s how mayo is made; it’s always made, if it’s real, it’s made from egg yolk. I’m sorry, go ahead, you were going to say something else about it.

Liz Wolfe: No, I can’t even remember.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}

Liz Wolfe: I just think the chances are fairly low, but everything is a calculated risk. That’s what I keep; I keep saying this to people on Instagram and Facebook. Most of the recent Listeria outbreaks, I think, that the CDC has recorded, I think were due to cantaloupe and spinach. You’re just not; eating is a calculated risk. And if your digestion is good and your stomach acid is good, then there’s a lesser chance of getting sick, I would think.

Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, it’s not something that concerns me at all. And chances are if you do get sick from it, you’ll be in the bathroom, and then you’ll discover that you got sick from it. It’s probably not going to be that big of a deal. I don’t know if maybe he or she is worried about salmonella; that’s definitely something that I think is probably a little bit more concerning. But honestly, I’m not somebody who; I’m not a worrier, so I don’t think about that stuff.

Liz Wolfe: {laughs}

Diane Sanfilippo: But I also lately don’t make my own mayo, I use the Primal Kitchen stuff because I really like it. So there’s that.

4. To do a challenge or not [24:38]

Liz Wolfe: There’s that. Alright, this one is from; I don’t know how to say it.

Diane Sanfilippo: Did we answer that next one already?

Liz Wolfe: I don’t think so.

Diane Sanfilippo: In a previous episode?

Liz Wolfe: I think we have addressed; so, the question is “Best to start with a challenge or is there a more sustainable approach?” So I feel like we’ve talked around this, or maybe even addressed it in previous podcasts, and I think the answer is; it depends on your personality type.

Diane Sanfilippo: I would agree with that.

Liz Wolfe: And I would also say; and we were talking about this during the last podcast.

Diane Sanfilippo: Mm-hmm.

Liz Wolfe: Really ask yourself if the way you currently conceive of yourself as operating, such as labeling yourself as “I’m a…person that needs a strict set of rules, and I can’t moderate myself” or whatever. If you are identifying yourself that way, really, really dig in deep and question that. Because I discovered after many decades of trying to do things one way that I actually can moderate fairly well. So, yeah. I just think it has to come from there. Search through some of our other podcasts; the last paleo 101 and maybe, what would be a good search term on the website?

Diane Sanfilippo: Also, the episode I did with Gretchen Rubin, which we mentioned in the previous, the part 1 of this series is a good one. We talked about being an abstainer versus a moderator. And I honestly think that either that or if your personality is one of an Upholder or an Obliger, somebody who likes having rules kind of created by someone else, then that can be a good indication that a challenge is a good way to start. And it really also depends, I think, on just what’s your level of frustration with your current situation. You know what I mean?

Liz Wolfe: Mm-hmm.

Diane Sanfilippo: If you’re feeling like, eh, you might be eating a little too much sugar, and it’s not that big of a deal, and you feel very much like you could just handle it, you know, then handle it and take an approach that you think is sustainable. But by the nature of the wording of this question, I have the impression that this person might be a Moderator, because they think a challenge might not be sustainable.

Liz Wolfe: Mm-hmm.

Diane Sanfilippo: Right? Because they’re saying, “is there a more sustainable approach?” And of course, a challenge isn’t intended to be your whole life. It’s intended to be 21 days, 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, 12 weeks, whatever it’s going to be. It’s intended to be for a time period. But if you think that’s not sustainable, but you might be a moderator if {laughs} you think that’s not sustainable. So, you have to do that self exploration and figure out what has worked for you in the past and set yourself up for success by creating a format for yourself that you will operate well under going forward. And that’s what I think.

5. Tree nuts versus other nuts [27:31]

Liz Wolfe: I like it. Alright, oh man.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}

Liz Wolfe: I can’t do this one either. Therodiamond… ugh. {laughs} It could be so many! Like the last one could have been Sutal or it could have been HSUTo or Suto. Ok, this one could be…

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} That’s the fun part for me.

Liz Wolfe: Therodiamondo, I don’t know.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughing}

Liz Wolfe: It must be a joke I don’t get.

Diane Sanfilippo: I don’t know.

Liz Wolfe: Ok. “What's the deal with tree nuts versus not tree nuts?”

Diane Sanfilippo: I’m not sure how to unpack this question, really, but they’re just two different categories of nuts, and typically when it comes to allergies people tend to be either allergic to tree nuts or not. So, from my understanding, almonds, pecans, walnuts, hazelnuts, those are all tree nuts, where as peanuts, cashews, I’m going to guess pine nuts and pistachios, the more legume-y type nuts are actually not tree nuts. I believe their legumes or some other type of family, so when we’re talking about allergies, that’s really where the distinction comes into play.

For example, I have an oral allergy to tree nuts. I can’t do almonds, pecans, walnuts; I can’t do all the good nuts, that’s basically the way I describe it. Any of the good ones, I can’t eat. {laughs} So I think, almonds, walnuts, pecans, and hazelnuts are kind of the good ones, and those are all tree nuts. So that’s really what it is, and actually tree nuts are the ones considered paleo, where as the more legume type nuts; peanuts, cashews. I think pistachios have been an on the fence nut when it comes to paleo.

Liz Wolfe: {laughing} Oh my god.

Diane Sanfilippo: I don’t ever hear of people really dissing pistachios to eat paleo. But I’m pretty {laughs} I’m pretty whatever. Whatever nuts float your boat go for it. I think some people have a lot of issues with peanuts. We’ve talked a lot about things like aflatoxin and issues with peanuts in the past. I personally, because I cannot eat almond butter, I eat a small amount of peanut butter now and then and I feel fine eating it. I also don’t have a lot of other health challenges and health issues that would cause me to be extra careful, so I think that’s kind of where it’s a little bit grey area for you.

Liz Wolfe: Lovely.

Diane Sanfilippo: That’s about it.

Liz Wolfe: “Sugar dates and pistachios!”

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} What is that?

Liz Wolfe: That’s from Aladdin. “Should we call you Al, or maybe just Din?”

Diane Sanfilippo: Oh, little Mason. We’ve talked about this before. I know you’ve talked about what you feed your pups, as well, so if somebody is curious about what we feed them and also wants to hear about feeding dogs I know you guys can check out the archives. But generally, I feed Paleo Kitty a mix of the following, with not so much of a calculated attempt at balancing it in any particular way. #Notintominutia.

So, in the beginning when I fed him I tried to be really careful to feed him about 80% muscle meat and about 20% organs and like raw meaty bones, and I just haven’t been as careful. That’s just the honest truth. We feed him raw chicken thighs. I don’t tend to get any pastured; I don’t even actually give him organic unless we’re out. We usually get him whatever the baseline version, or maybe the natural, whatever it is at Trader Joe’s, or if I am at Whole Foods and I need to get some there, I’ll get it there. But I usually try not to spend quite as much per pound on the chicken thighs I’ll get for him.

But we usually do skinless chicken thighs; sometimes it will be, sometimes it will have skin but I have to cut that up a little bit smaller. And I also give him organs, so for example this weekend at the farmer’s market I picked up some lamb kidneys because it was $2 for this pack of kidneys. I was like, ok, alright, I’ll cut that up for him. He gets all of that raw. We cut it into about 1 to 2 inch pieces. He can handle that. He’s been eating raw since he’s probably, I can’t remember how old he was when I got him, but I want to say not more than 8 weeks old when I got him, so he’s been eating raw since then.

He also eats raw bones if we have them. I’ll give him a raw chicken thigh bone if I ever cut the thigh off the bone. I do give him a chicken thigh bone if I’ve eaten the chicken thigh off of it. I know my cat well enough to know that he will stop at the splintery parts. So he’ll just eat the cartilage off the ends, and he’ll leave about an inch, inch and a half of a splintery part. I know a lot of people who are just super against feeding a pet anything that’s been cooked from bones, because they can be very splintery, but I’ve watched him for the last 8 years and I know he will not try and eat that. He’ll just leave it behind in a slobbery mess on the floor. {laughs} Which is fine, so he gets the cartilage off of there.

We also give him sometimes chicken necks; whatever kind of parts I can find at the grocery store, or I’ll go searching for them. Gizzards, livers; he absolutely loves chicken livers. He loves raw egg yolk, so if I’m doing something and the yolk breaks or I just want to give him a treat, I’ll give him a yolk. I’ll separate it from the white, and he will go to town on that.

And when we’re being particularly lazy and/or we’re going out of town and we have our friends watching him, we will feed him canned wild salmon from Trader Joe’s. I’m like, “this is people food! You better love this!” {laughs} Canned wild salmon from Trader Joe’s. That is a cooked salmon, we get the one without sodium or any salt added, and he eats the can, about a can of that. He eats about, I would say about 6 ounces of food a day. We feed him once a day. We only feed him once a day at night. I started doing that because we would leave town; well, I would leave town when I first got him, and I would have friends watching him, and having somebody have to stop over twice a day was just a little bit crazy, but because he eats raw I didn’t want to leave food out all day for him, because, you know, it’s raw. So, I used to have people coming over twice a day, but then I read up on it, and read that cats can go to once a day feeding pretty easily, so he eats in the evening anywhere between probably 4, 5, and like 9 p.m. just in that time frame.

He just eats that; we don’t give him any treats except some catnip now and then. I don’t know, he seems to be in pretty good health. He’s about 8 years old. He’s the first raw fed cat that I’ve had, so I can’t say I’m an expert on it. I can’t say I know for sure what the outcome of this will be, but I’m doing the best I can.

Also, what we didn’t mention is what he eats, which is not what I feed him. He is a rascal, which he was the other day, and I forgot to put away roast beef. This beautiful, grass-fed roast beef that I got from Whole Foods. This cat legit ate probably close to half a pound of grass fed roast beef. I just forgot I left it on the counter; we don’t let him on the counter, but there was meat there and he jumped up there {laughs}. And we heard him jump down, and we didn’t go look at what he was doing, because I just forgot that I had anything out, and I was like, “you little jerk!” Ugh. So he ate about 8 pounds, 8 pounds; $8 worth of roast beef. I was kind of pissed about it, mostly because I wanted the roast beef, not because he ate the meat. But anyway, I digress. So that’s what we feed him.

Liz Wolfe: Thank you for that.

Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah. {laughs}

7. NEU5GC sugar molecule in red meat [35:54]

Liz Wolfe: {laughs} This next one is Verilanies. I don’t know; jeeze, people make your Instagram handles more easy for me.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}

Liz Wolfe: Alright, “Any comment on the studies about the Neu5Gc sugar molecule in beef, pork, and lamb. My health coach is steering me away from beef, but it doesn’t seem to me the potential risks outweigh the benefits of high quality beef. I’d love to hear your thoughts; thanks.”

Man, well we’re going to answer this really, really briefly. But, some health coaches will do anything to make people stop eating red meat.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}

Liz Wolfe: Anything. So, Robb Wolf and Chris Kresser discussed this, I guess, about a year ago, and we’ll put the link up in the show notes, yeah?

Diane Sanfilippo: Yes. It was almost exactly a year ago, so I would default to that, for sure.

Liz Wolfe: I think the summary is; don’t freak out.

Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah. Eat high quality red meat.

36.55

Liz Wolfe: Alright, cool. Alright, this one is from BekahBanick. “Essentials that you shouldn’t be without in a paleo pantry or freezer.” Oh, well for me that’s a can of good, high quality, crap free tomato sauce, and some coconut aminos, and some Primal Kitchen mayo. What else? I don’t know.

Diane Sanfilippo: Coconut milk, I would say.

Liz Wolfe: Coconut oil.

Diane Sanfilippo: I pretty much always have that; yeah, coconut oil. Some ghee if you’re making it, I would say that’s a good pantry staple. It does stay in the pantry. Did you say a crap-free tomato sauce, is that what you said?

Liz Wolfe: Yeah.

Diane Sanfilippo: Ok, yeah, I’m with you on that.

Liz Wolfe: Not pasta sauce, but you know, for spaghetti squash.

Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, or a pasta sauce. Something that’s just a super clean version. Let’s see, the freezer; for me, the freezer is where we store a good portion of our meat. I just think; look, you guys, I’m a meat hoarder for sure. We go to the farmer’s market, I’m like, get all the meat. Get everything we can fit. Because we’ll go through it pretty quickly, and I would so much rather have really high quality meat on hand that we just defrost a day or two ahead and be able to turn to that than to kind of be stuck. I mean, we buy plenty of our meat at the grocery story as we need to, but I have plenty of meat in there and plenty of veggies. Those are staples.

I’ve done quite a few refrigerator peaks on Periscope. We’ll probably try and get those into one blog post at some point so you guys can all take a look at my fridge and my freezer. And I think I’ve done a pantry one before, too, and I’m pretty sure Michelle from Nom Nom Paleo has done probably all of the above, so if you guys want to take a look.

I think it’s important, also, to keep some homemade broth in the freezer, because when you get sick, you don’t have time to make broth. And if you want healing food, you don’t want stock in a box. You want your own real homemade broth so I think that’s a pretty good one to also have on hand.

Liz Wolfe: Very good.

Diane Sanfilippo: I think that’s probably all we have time for today.

Liz Wolfe: Wowie, zowie, we’re done already?

Diane Sanfilippo: I know. I think we; maybe we have time for one more question. {laughs}

Liz Wolfe: Ok. Let’s grab.

Diane Sanfilippo: Maybe this one from; there’s two down here.

Liz Wolfe: Those two.

Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah; or, yeah, if you think we can rapid fire those.

Liz Wolfe: And “not lacking a specific nutrient; also benefit versus harm of eating lots of raw veggies especially cruciferous veggies.” I think there’s been one documented account in the literature of a woman eating like so much bok choy that she gave herself some kind of health condition. I don’t know; I would rotate veggies because they have plant defense mechanisms, and I think a ton of cruciferous veggies could potentially be goitrogenic in the already vulnerable.

Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah.

Liz Wolfe: I don’t think it happens a lot, but it could happen.

Diane Sanfilippo: My tack on to getting enough vitamins and minerals; to eat lots of different colored foods. Obviously, those are going to be plant foods, so if you’re eating fruits and veggies, make sure you’re eating greens, and purples, and oranges, and reds, and pinks; all the colors, basically. That’s a really, really good way to get a lot of vitamins and minerals. And you can enter stuff into a calculator, if you want to see what’s happening with the micronutrients, but it’s really hard to know, too, it’s hard to know what they calculated it based on. Was it organic food, was it local food? And when in doubt, go for the richly colored foods and you’ll be good.

Benefit versus harm; I think most cruciferous veggies are not that palatable raw, and so I’m not really sure who is over-eating raw cruciferous veggies, to be honest. I think some people are just that into raw broccoli. I am not.

Liz Wolfe: {laughs}

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} And raw kale, and all that stuff. So, I don’t think there’s specifically a ton of benefit to eating a lot of them raw other than perhaps vitamin C content, but you can get vitamin C from foods that are much more palatable raw, like bell pepper, if you were to cut up a bell pepper. Obviously, I mean, I think most people would agree that, unless you’re having trouble digesting the skin, they’re really easy to eat raw. They’re crunchy, you can dip them in some liver.

Liz Wolfe: {laughing}

Diane Sanfilippo: Into some pate. {laughs} Dip your peppers in liver. No, dip them in some pate, whatever. Anyway, that’s kind of the breakdown there, but I think we’ve talked about that before, too. So, we probably have previous episodes on that.

9. Eating nuts without soaking them first [42:12]

Liz Wolfe: Ok. KellyCharlieSawyer.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}

Liz Wolfe: “I eat a ton of raw nuts, but I’m not very good at soaking them first. Is it really that bad?” What is a ton? Because if it was technically a ton, that would definitely be a problem.

Diane Sanfilippo: Literally a ton? Really?

Liz Wolfe: Literally. One ton. I think if you eat a ton of raw nuts; I would say if you were eating a small handful of raw nuts every day, I think that’s plenty of nuts because they are rich in polyunsaturated fatty acids. If I was eating that much, a handful a day, I would probably make a point to soak them.

Diane Sanfilippo: I also think that, it may have been Matt Lalonde or somebody else who talked about the fact that roasted; like, for a while we thought roasting them was bad because we could damage the oils. But then, I feel like I read about this where just like when we’re cooking salmon, for example, because it’s intact in the whole food and there’s more protection when the food is whole versus the isolated polyunsatured fatty acid, the oils just on their own. Roasted nuts actually have lower antinutrient value than raw, which is the one thing we’re trying to deactivate when we soak, as well.

If you soak them you probably want to dehydrate them too, because soaked almonds, for example, they don’t taste good. They taste really bland. Back when I could eat them, I tasted them, I was like; these are terrible, I don’t want to eat this. So I don’t think it’s really that bad. I think it’s minutia, and I also think if your digestion feels weird, then I would scale back on it, or I would soak them and then dehydrate them, or I might consider roasting them, too. I remember; I think it was definitely a conversation with Matt Lalonde where he was like; no, if you’re roasting them and they’re whole, they are protected by the fact that they are in their whole form, and you’re probably not overheating them. But you could roast them or toast them on a very low heat if you wanted to.

Liz Wolfe: Alright. I think we’re done for the day.

Diane Sanfilippo: I think that’s it.

Liz Wolfe: Thanks for showing up friend.

Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} Of course.

Liz Wolfe: {laughs} So that’s it for the week. You can find me, Liz, at https://realfoodliz.com/ and you can find Diane at http://dianesanfilippo.com. Join our email lists for free goodies and updates that you don’t find anywhere else on our website or on the podcast. While you’re on the internet, please leave us an iTunes review. See you next week.

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